2. Contents
• The product and the company
• The role of Smalltalk
• Development
• Marketing
• Pricing
• Mistakes
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3. History
• Contract to do a simple chart program
• 1 year (3 man months)
• First of its kind -> Market?
• smallCharts Trademark
• Help Website
• Contract with business newspaper
• ½ year (4,5 man months)
• Opened company
• Second contract as a company
• ½ year (3 man months)
• Marketing Website
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4. The Product
• Examples…
• Each version had a long development
• More features
• Better design
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5. Unique Selling Proposition
• Automates the Chart creation for print
• Cheaper
• Faster
• Later
• More correct
• More consistent
• Simpler
• More direct
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6. Why a Company?
• Independent legal entity (GmbH)
• Partners
• Infrastructure
• Costumer recognition
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7. The Role of Smalltalk
• None!
• …except
• Would not have done initial project
• For remarks that this change was quick
• For exploring external interfaces on the fly
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8. Being a Company
• Is about profitability
• People
• Organization (transparency)
• Bureaucracy (Government, Internal)
• Partners (explicit Plans and Goals)
• Website, logo
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9. Development Process
• Needs to be professional
• Delivery
• Testing
• Tracking features, bugs and time
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10. Marketing
• Find customers
• Get the product known
• Specific target market (Impressum)
• Talk to the decision makers
• Gatherings
• Word of mouth
• Presenting
• Networking with other Start-ups
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11. Pricing
• Price model
• License, rent or lease
• Complexity
• Price level
• No competitors
• Costs for the customers are not known
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12. Mistakes
• No Marketing
• Hope on Word-of-mouth advertizing
• Did not want to do Marketing
• Underestimated development time
• Underestimated customer decision process
• GmbH with a Partner
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